Master John tol' me jus' to tell my story and ask my question right here to you folks. He laughed when I asked him the question and he won't answer it himself but he said that maybe you would tell me the answer. He said first to tell who we all are and what we do here at Belle Field. Then I could ask the question. So, here it comes.

My name is Ellen. I'm a slave to Mr. John Ambrose. He's my owner. Actually my momma belonged to him first and when he knocked her up and made me, I was his property too.

Mr. Beau is my use-master. Mr. John gave me to him as a riding mare while he's stayin' here on Belle Field Plantation this time. So mainly I've been his bedwarmer since last fall when I had my birthday. I was fifteen last October and Mr. Beau rode me, for my first time ever, as my "birthday present" from him. He's given "birthday presents" to girls in my line for a while now, because girls in my line have been given to him as bedwarmers for a while now.

Him and Master John and Master Abe bin friends a long time. They trade us mares around mostly whichever way they want. About the only thing they don't do is cover a mare with her sire. Sometimes people who don't live here can be confused by all this, 'specially 'cause most of us come from the same family. If what I'm sayin' doesn't make sense right away listen a little longer as I'll probably explain it a little later.

Mr. Beau had a birthday too, right before Master John told me to tend for him. He's really old. That birthday, just before mine, he turned sixty. That's at least 3 times older than me. But he doesn't act really old when he takes me for a ride. In fact I like doin' IT (and I like Him too). I've been real glad that Master John told him to ride me. And momma and 'Ginia and I can sometimes talk about him because he used to ride them too

Neither Master John, Master Beau nor Master Abe has wives. They all live here at Belle Field — at least most of the time, and us slaves do the work they tell us to do. Mr. Beau has been on and off the plantation more than the other masters. That's because he goes to the big cities to do business, to buy stuff like tools and horses and sell stuff like our crops. He only went away once since my birthday and they let me stay in his rooms on a pallet on the floor the whole two weeks he was gone. That was somethin' good because I didn't have to go back down to the field cabins and work there while he was gone. But I was happy when he came back from Charleston too because I like to sleep with him up in his big bed, better than down on the pallet, and I din't have much to do when he wasn't here to take care for.

The field slaves work under the foremen who get told what to do by one of the Masters, usually Mr. Abe. The Masters are the only white folk here on the place. They got no women, no kids, just us. All of us here is property of Mr. John, and the other Masters help him to run the plantation. Mr. John and Mr. Beau live most of the time here at the house. Master Abe, he generally stays down in a house by the field slave's quarters, even though he has rooms here at the house.

The overseer here at the house is Samuel. He tells most of us what to do to keep the house runnin' right. He works most with my momma and with Mamma Tallia. Mamma Tallia's the cook and she runs the kitchens. She also runs the two boys and the girl who work in the house garden and do the other outside work as churnen the milk, bringin' in the firewood and they do the like in the kitchen too. Samuel mostly tells my momma what to do to keep the house clean and looking good and she tells us girls what we gotta do.

My momma is Mary. She became Mr. Beau's bedwarmer when she was only 12 years old. He's the one who put her "opened" ring in her and he branded her too. After he knocked her up and had made my sister Aphrodite he milked momma for about 6 months. Then he put her aside when he went to N'orleens (but she had got her nipple ring from him because he dried her up before he left). When Mr. Beau left for N'orleens, Master John took momma for his bedwarmer. That's why Mr. John is the Master who made my sister Virginia and me. He's also the one who put her other nipple ring into momma, when he stopped milking her after 'Ginia was made.

'Dite been takin' care of Master John now since momma was made in charge of the girls who care for the master's rooms and the 'social' part of the house. Most of the time now momma don't warm no master's bed unless he call for her special. But us girls figure she warmin' Samuel's covers regular-like.